


raze out the written troubles of the brain

by bookoftheazuresky



Category: Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha ViVid, Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha | Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha
Genre: Belkans and their human rights violations, Bleeding Effect, Dissociation, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Magical Combat, Mental Health Discussions, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-13
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-11-16 11:19:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18093326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookoftheazuresky/pseuds/bookoftheazuresky
Summary: So when Einhart walks into the special training grounds with a bit of a distance in her eyes, quieter than usual, Nove doesn’t really note anything down as wrong. Einhart is, after all, usually quiet: an introvert, even if she gets along with the other girls better these days.Companion piece and prequel to pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow.





	raze out the written troubles of the brain

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bluefriday](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluefriday/gifts).
  * Inspired by [pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15918741) by [bookoftheazuresky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookoftheazuresky/pseuds/bookoftheazuresky). 



> In the companion piece to this work, I referenced an incident between Einhart and Vivio where Nove had to intervene due to a flashback. A reviewer expressed interest in reading about the incident, which got me thinking about how it would have gone.
> 
> Translations and spell notes are at the end of the story.

The hell of it is, it’s subtle, until it isn’t.

Nove’s not exactly a stranger to traumatized girls; she and her sisters, both the ones she was raised with and the ones who took her in, qualify for that category. It’s just that she’s gotten used to Mid, used to thinking that girls who aren’t in uniform aren’t blades. She’s always been a younger sister, used to relying on Cinque (and Tre) and Ginga to look after the mission, after the status of others. She still goes to counseling once a week, and it hasn’t been that long since she got out of the TSAB’s rehab. She can look at a martial artist and spot the flaws in their technique, but spotting the flaws in someone’s psyche is not a skill she’s had much time with.

So when Einhart walks into the special training grounds with a bit of a distance in her eyes, quieter than usual, she doesn’t really note anything down as _wrong._ Einhart is, after all, usually quiet: an introvert, even if she gets along with the other girls better these days. And there’s nothing that would ping a Combat Cyborg’s eye in her motions, nothing off in her stance. If anything, she’s more fluent than usual, a little better than her usual metrics.

A bit more concerning is the way that Einhart doesn’t seem to be paying attention to Corona and Rio’s match, even though this is the first formal match they’ve had after Corona mastered her Adult Mode transformation. Vivio’s heterochromatic eyes are glued to the swift dance as Corona precisely avoided taking the full force behind any of Rio’s blows, but Einhart might as well have been a thousand years away. Occasionally, the older girl’s eyes will land on the two fighters with something like attention, and sometimes they will fall on Vivio with something warmer, but for the most part she seems lost in her own head.

Nove calls the match for Rio, letting her other two charges prepare for their own match. Corona has been rubbing her sternum where Rio had landed her last hit, so Nove presses fingers up and down her ribcage until she is reassured it is just a bruise. Through a full Barrier Jacket, good grief.

“Rio, remind me when we get back to adjust your Device’s practice mode and the gym’s profile for you,” Nove says, rising to her full height from the crouch she had taken for the examination. “You’ve gained a lot of muscle mass recently, so you’re hitting harder.” Addressing Corona this time, she says, “And you might want to think about a different Jacket design if you’re going to keep the infight portion of your offense. I know you hate trading off magic for defense, but this isn’t the Intermiddle. You don’t get health metrics in most tournaments.” Nove likes heavier Jackets herself, much like Subaru, but Corona has been reluctant to move in that direction because of her hybrid style, much of which depended on having mana to cast with.

“Yes, Nove,” both girls chorus obediently.

“Einhart, Vivio.” Nove jerks her thumb at the platform. Einhart blinks a little, and moves into the field. Both of them cast their transformations and Barrier Jackets with no problem, so Nove settles in to observe.

Maybe Einhart was just contemplating the upcoming match, Nove thinks as the older girl lunges in with a surprising amount of focus. She’s still ahead of Vivio by a good margin, but Vivio, a Takamachi to the core, has been responding wonderfully to the challenge of Kaiser Arts. Though, Nove notes, not great today. The fluency Nove had seen earlier is translating into a perfect offense that even Vivio’s attempted counters are sliding off of.

Vivio’s mouth has gone tight with focus; she catches the edge of one of Einhart’s hits and winces and that’s when Nove realizes that Einhart is starting to fight less like she’s in a tournament and more like one of the Wolkenritter: a perfect, mindless grace that has nothing to with points and calls and everything to do with the battlefield.

“Einhart!” she barks. “Bring it down!”

A mistake. Vivio’s eyes dart towards Nove, and Einhart drops her center of gravity and slams her whole forearm into Vivio’s core, all of her weight and magic behind it.

Sacred Heart’s autodefense keeps Vivio from being knocked off the platform, but only just. The blonde girl wheezes for breath from her place on the ground, hair trailing on the floor, red and green eyes wide.

Einhart says something, but the words make no sense to Nove’s ears. Still, the cadence and sound of it is somewhat familiar- she thinks first of Erio, then of Signum’s low-voiced asides to Vita when telepathy went down mid-mission. Belkan, spoken in Einhart’s mournful tones.

Oh, Nove thinks, remembering Sieg and Einhart’s Intermiddle match, this is _bad_.

She’s in the ring before she can think better of it, Jet Edge weaving her Jacket across her shoulders in swift slashes of yellow. Einhart punches her in what is probably pure reflex; Nove catches the blow like she might do with Subaru, her cybernetics letting her absorb the force.

“Steh runter, Ritter,” Einhart says in tones of command, apparently unconcerned that Nove still has her hand. “Diese Schlacht gehört nicht dir.”

The only word Nove understands is ‘knight,’ but it’s pretty easy to tell that Einhart is telling her to stay out of it. /Vivio,/ she says telepathically, /get out of the ring so I can calm her down. And get a line to Zafira just in case./ Zafira’s the only person she knows that speaks Belkan who can also be here relatively quickly. And is also a Wolkenritter, so Nove doesn’t feel too bad about expecting him to deal with Ancient Belkan problems.

“Einhart,” Nove said, pitching her voice low and doing the universal ‘I’m unarmed and not threatening’ gesture with her free hand. Einhart tracks the hand but shows no comprehension at her name. Nove debates for a second, and tries: “Ingvalt.”

That does it- Einhart’s looking back at her face, with an expression more suited to Tre or Cinque thinking about how many sharp things they could stab you with. Still, attention is attention. “Ingvalt, I need you to calm down. The match is over. Why don’t you put away your Barrier Jacket and-“

Nove is lucky she’s a Combat Cyborg and has fantastic reflexes. She notices Einhart’s blue and purple eyes flick in Vivio’s direction as the girl moves and she jerks her chin back just in time to avoid a roundhouse. Einhart yanks her hand free, smoothly stepping back and getting into stance.

Then Einhart hip checks into her, coming in low with the intent of forcing her into the air and off of her feet. With Air Liner it doesn’t actually matter, so Nove coats her left hand with Jet Edge’s auto-Protection, gets it in front of the blow, and takes the hit. It rattles her down to her reinforced bones, but Nove is heavier, denser, and tougher than a woman of her height and build should be, and it doesn’t knock her into the air like it intended to.

She cues up Gun Shooter, yellow energy bullets forming around her right fist, and fires straight down into Einhart. The girl makes a sound of annoyance at the holes in her Jacket, coils into her position under Nove, and casts, green triangles snapping into focus: “Zenitstürmer.”

It’s a good thing that Nove still has Protection in between herself and Einhart, or she would be in serious pain. She still tastes blood, but uses the upward momentum this time to combo into a Revolver Spike. With a precise calculation that echoed their first fight, Einhart steps in so that Nove hits with her knee and backhands her across the face with reinforced and glowing knuckles.

Jet Edge works her body while her brain reels, Inherent Equipment tying itself into her cybernetics to plant her hands on the ground and smash an armored heel into Einhart’s side. This blow actually lands, but Einhart sketches a circle with her heel to bleed off the force, turning with it.

“Fokusstoß.” It’s the first bombardment spell that Nove has ever seen Einhart use, a midrange exploding type like Gun Flame. Nove kicks off a piece of Air Liner to avoid it, twisting to land on her feet again.

“Bind,” she grits, locking an arm and a heel and the girl’s neck- she can almost hear Subaru yelling at her, but Subaru can judge when _she_ has to separate two reincarnated Belkan rulers, especially when one of them has her head back in the Warring States era.

Nove wishes uselessly for Subaru or Ginga’s Revolver Knuckle; she just doesn’t hit like a Series Zero, she’s made lighter and faster. “Strike Driver.” Lightning crackles around Gun Knuckle and she lunges.

Einhart lets her get close, eyes level despite the run of Nove’s IS ribbon around her throat. At the last possible second, the girl commands, “Ausräumen.”

…that sure was a Jacket Purge, Nove thinks humorlessly from her position flat on her back, then tightens her core and flips to her feet in a motion only a cyborg could make. Einhart meets her, trailing green streamers as her Jacket recasts, Sky Severing Fist at the ready. Nove decides, like she has all the time in the world, that outing herself as a Combat Cyborg in front of the kids is preferable to having Einhart accidentally seriously injure her while in the middle of a break with reality.

Einhart’s foot comes down, and rocks come up around it, delicate chains of yellow light wrapping up her leg and thigh. Nove makes a private note to _talk to Corona about her blatant disregard of potential danger_ , pulls back Gun Knuckle, and hits Einhart with the full weight of an adult Combat Cyborg behind it.

With her leg trapped and her forward momentum subverted, it is a solid blow. Einhart goes down bruisingly on her right shoulder and doesn’t get up. Nove has a brief flashback to Ginga’s violet hair draped across the ground just like that and takes a ragged breath at the recollection as well as the release of tension.

“Stay over there,” she orders the rest of her students without taking her eyes off Einhart. She kneels next to the girl and asks, “Jet Edge, can you communicate with Asteion?”

“Affirmative,” her Device replied.

“Tell him to cancel Einhart’s Adult Mode transformation and Barrier Jacket.” After a moment, green washes across Einhart’s limp body, and shatters away to reveal the thirteen-year-old underneath. A spreading bruise covers the left side of her face from Nove’s fist. She feels about as good about it as when she had beaten Ginga into unconsciousness and stuffed her into a box. The cat chirrups worriedly as Nove takes Einhart’s pulse (accelerated but slowing) and checks her for other injuries.

Now, thankfully, is when Zafira decides to arrive, shifting from the galloping wolf he must have been to get here to running man. “Shamal?” Nove asks him hopefully.

“Shamal,” he confirms. “Let me just get a quick scan so we’ll know she’s safe to move.”

~

“PTSD,” Shamal says. She has fixed the various bruises that Nove and Einhart gave each other, and is now sitting next to the bed where they deposited the girl, expression pensive. “It’s only to be expected. Belkans always were more interested in if they _could_ acquire knowledge than asking themselves if they _should_.” Coming from an incarnate form of the Book of Darkness, the condemnation has a particular weight.

“I should have come to you before,” Nove half-laments.

Shamal shrugs, a small lift of her shoulders. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. With these things, it’s hard to know the optimal path.”

Einhart stirs in the bed, heterochomatic eyes opening. “Olivie…?” she says, softly, then, “Olivie!” She sits up, causing Nove to tense, though Shamal remains placid. The girl asks Shamal a question, her voice shaking with urgency.

“Sie ist schon lange tot,” Shamal replies, voice calm but unbending as only a Wolkenritter’s could be. “Du erinnerst dich nicht, aber du kennst die Wahrheit.”

Nove is only a little surprised when Einhart’s eyes fill with tears. The girl covers her face and weeps. Shamal makes a peremptory motion when Nove makes to rise, which is probably wise. Hugging an Einhart who doesn’t know her or speak Mid is a bad idea, and the only other thing to do is leave the room.

Doesn’t Einhart have a family to help deal with this? She had mentioned cousins in a desultory way that implies she doesn’t know them well. But Nove knows the girl lives alone. Even Intermiddle sign-ups don’t require a guardian’s signature, only the participant’s and a coach’s, so Nove doesn’t have that either. Damn, Nove has been calling herself a coach all this time, but she doesn’t even have the comm numbers of her students’ next of kin except for Nanoha. She needs to get it together and start acting like a professional.

During Nove’s internal flagellation, Einhart’s sobs dwindle away to hitched breaths, until she swipes away the tears with the heel of her hand and looks up. “I-“ she starts, then looks around with confusion. Then growing alarm. Her eyes light on Nove and widen in a way that would almost be comical. “N-nove? Where…” she trails off, then looks at Shamal, who is still calm. Then she says, in a voice so empty as to almost be dead, “I hurt you.”

Nove sorts through several possible responses, and replies, “I gave you a concussion, so I think we’re still about even.”

Einhart hiccups, apparently not expecting this.

“Einhart-chan,” Shamal says mildly, “I am fairly certain this has never happened to you before?” The healer gives the question a gentle rising inflection to invite correction.

“Not-“ Einhart chokes, “like this, it’s usually just little things, things I remember, a few minutes I lose-“ the girl forces a breath, then blurts, as if desperate to get it off of her chest, to explain _why_ , “but Klaus committed suicide- after- after Olivie d-died, a few years, maybe five.”

Nove’s breath freezes in her lungs. Shamal doesn’t look surprised, only asks, “Have you ever hurt yourself, Einhart-chan?”

The girl recovers enough to give her a look of disdain. “Nove can share my training regimen with you, I’m sure.”

“You are aware that adolescent suicide is common among those with similar inheritances,” Shamal says. It’s not a guess, there’s no inflection of a question in that.

Einhart sighs, deflating, and says tiredly, “Yes, family records support that.” Her green-silver hair covers her eyes. “The legacy of the Hegemon.”

“And being around Vivio makes it better, worse, or has no effect that you can tell? Or does it vary?”

“I-“ Einhart thinks for a moment, eyes moving back and forth like she was reviewing memories. “Not _bad_ , usually. Nostalgic?” The girl frowns at the word. “Like meeting someone again from when you were very little and almost don’t remember them, just a vague…” She waves a hand, then says, “But Klaus, the…piece of him that I inherited, his feelings are still there. And in Adult Mode, Vivio looks very much like Olivie, as the Sankt Kaiser. The way she died.”

“Yes, I suppose so.” Nove has a second to realize that Shamal might very well _remember_ the last Sankt Kaiser, or her family, before Shamal says, “I’m afraid you have a form of post-traumatic stress disorder, Einhart-chan. From what you’ve said, and I have observed, the cause is memory and consciousness imprinting via Linker Core and genetic engineering from the Warring States period.” Shamal paused. “Unfortunately, from what I can tell without a full workup…due to the method in which it was accomplished, the imprinting has not completely initialized, because you haven’t reached maturity yet.”

“At which point I will have full access to my ancestor’s memories of the worst points of his life, which caused him to commit suicide before he turned twenty-five,” Einhart summarizes tiredly. “I know.”

Shamal nods. Nove clenches her fists on the hem of her shorts at Einhart’s defeated summary. Her small shoulders are bowed under the weight of it.

“With your permission, Einhart-chan, I would like to do that full workup. I have more experience and knowledge of Ancient Belkan magic than anyone alive, so it's possible that I can offer some insight into your situation, if not a solution.” Shamal leans until she can make eye contact with Einhart. “I can also consult with colleagues who have treated people in similar situations to your own. There is no reason why you have to deal with this alone.”

“That’s right,” Nove says. Einhart turns her eyes from Shamal back over to Nove. “The reason why I’m able to live a normal life now is because a lot of people helped me. Even though I didn’t know or expect anything else. It wasn’t fair, and I didn’t ask to be born the way I was, and you didn’t either. But there are people out there- and in here,” she thumps her own chest, “who want to support you. To help you be okay, whatever that looks like for you.”

“Nove,” Einhart whispers, eyes glimmering with tears.

Nove, obeying some Subaru-instilled instinct, gets up and reaches for Einhart’s calloused hand. She sits on the edge of the bed, and isn’t really surprised when the girl folds into her arms, weeping once again

**Author's Note:**

> Einhart: Stand down, knight. This battle is not yours.
> 
> Shamal: She has been dead a long time. You do not remember, but you know the truth.
> 
> Zenitstürmer: a magic-enhanced attack. The user casts from directly under the center of gravity of the target and launches them into the air with a spike of magical energy. Can be chained into from simple attacks or Sky-Severing Fist.
> 
> Fokusstoß: a bombardment spell, short to midrange. The user launches a burst of focused magical energy that detonates with a shockwave. Usually cast down at an angle, but can also be used to produce spherical blasts if detonated in midair.
> 
> Strike Driver: a magic-enhanced attack. The user focuses electrical and kinetic energy into a blow. Effective against electronics and can induce paralysis or muscle tremors.
> 
> Ausräumen: the Ancient Belkan command for detonating the outer layer of Combat Equipment or Knight Armor. Lowers the user’s defenses until the Combat Equipment can be rebuilt.


End file.
